Tobias Carroll interviewed me about Albert Camus, multi-tasking, THE STRANGEST, identity as a literary theme, and more for Volume 1 Brooklyn.

It’s true. I’m fascinated with identity. It’s one of the most important aspects of an individual in the face of a society that quickly judges and forms assumptions upon the nature of the individual’s identity. There are a number of basic questions that open up what I feel to be seemingly endless curiosities: How much of an individual’s identity is manufactured by their upbringing? How much of it is under direct control of the individual, capable of sculpting and/or designing a persona? What kind of effects does society inflict upon the ideal identity? Are we able to evolve our identities by choice as we navigate through society’s various pressures, responsibilities, and hurdles, or are we essentially steeling, dispelling/redesigning in order to slip past? Why is it so difficult to abide by a more honest and open identity than one that is layered so as to be (seemingly) more complex, enigmatic, and impossible to fully comprehend?